REBUTTAL

College debating, which has undergone a considerable renascence at Harvard during the last two years, comes in for a round rating in an article in "The Educational Review" by Doctor Vernon L. Mangun, assistant professor at the University of New Hampshire, Harvard, Yale, and Princeton, which have been the foremost exponents of the new manly art of self defense, are cited as the outstanding culprits of a system that has saddled an incubus on the high schools. Whereas formerly the issue being debated has been regarded as of at least minor importance, it now received no attention whatever. And a million high school boys and girls, who find little of the abundant humor that the Debating Union finds in the prohibition question, are forced to follow in imitation of those who had hitherto been believed the most trust-worthy of guides.

The other point upon which college debating stands indicted in the mind of Doctor Mangun is the reversal of positions that each team must take in such a round-robin as the Harvard-Yale Princeton triangular debates. He quotes the damning evidence of the yellowed newspaper clipping. "Following their victory over the Yale affirmative the Harvard men demonstrated their versatility 'by taking the opposite side against Princeton and again winning the judges' decision.

Although a plea of guilty is the only possible reply to the accusations, it must also be remembered that both ideas are, like the Japanese beetle, importations. Responsibility for the practise is shared among the three colleges named, but the responsibility for the invention itself lies with Oxford. And the grievousness of the error is measurable in terms of the importance of debating as one of the forces on youth.